Our Dual Commission

"It is the divine plan that we shall work as the disciples worked. Physi­cal healing is bound up with the gospel commission. In the work of the gos­pel, teaching and healing are never to be separated."—"Ministry of Healing," p. 141. Often the preaching of the gos­pel and the practice of the gospel are so widely separated that the people have little faith that it is the gospel.

"In the ministry of the word and in the medical missionary work the gos­pel is to be preached and practiced."—Id., p. 144.

Why do we hold evangelistic efforts entirely divorced from practical gospel medical missionary work? Have we found a better way than that in which Christ worked? Can we improve upon the divine plan? "Christ's method alone will give true success in reaching the people."—/d., p. 143. In His work, teaching and healing were united. To­day they are not to be separated. "In His word God has united these two lines of work, and no man should di­vorce them. . . . Let them be joined in an inseparable union, even as the arm is joined to the body."—"Counsels on Health," pp. 515, 516.

When this union is preserved, the people have faith that the work done is Christ's work. In a certain small place where this plan of medical evan­gelism was followed, two nurses unit­ing ministry to the sick with the preaching of the evangelist, three min­isters of another denomination were brought from a distance to stop the work. But the people said, "They are doing the work Christ did;" and the work went on in spite of deter­mined and planned opposition.

Some have been impressed with one phase or another of the health work, and have united health lectures, cook­ing schools, or home nursing classes with the preaching services. This has been a long step in advance of the total divorcement of evangelistic and medi­cal missionary work. It has appealed to certain intelligent and practical classes, and widened the reach of evangelism. But even this is not the full gospel commission. Healing the sick implies also the teaching of healthful living, even as Christ said to the paralytic, "Sin no more, lest a worse thing come unto thee." But cooking schools and health lectures are only a part of medical evangelism. Direct ministry to the sick, the relief of pain, the restoration to health, will touch chords in the human heart which no amount of abstract health information can possibly reach.

It is this personal ministry to the people in their need that constitutes the practice of the gospel. Nearly all our evangelistic efforts are preaching, and often preaching alone, with little or no practice of the gospel. "In the medical missionary work the gospel is to be . . . practiced."

In small evangelistic efforts a nurse may unite with the minister and his helpers in visiting the people and min­istering to the sick. In larger efforts two nurses may profitably join the evangelist's staff. No large subsidy is needed, no extravagant outlay of means. The nurses may meet the peo­ple in their homes, and there minister to the sick. Using what they have to do with, they can give simple treat­ments, and help to prepare healthful food for the sick and also for those who are well.

When a sick person is found who must have help that requires an outlay of money, the visiting nurse may seek out a prosperous-looking home nearby, and in a visit there explain the nature of her ministry, and appeal for some monetary assistance. This will rarely if ever be refused. A little later the nurse can return to convey to the giver the thanks of the sick or needy one, and make a brief report of better­ment. Even as Christ at the well of Samaria—He who had so much to give that the woman needed—asked of her a drink of water, and so secured her attention and enlisted her interest; so also may the nurse enlist the rich, the idle, the pleasure lover, in a work which will in turn be a savor of life unto life. Later on the giver may be invited to visit the sick one in company with the nurse. Soon the satisfaction of helping the needy will bring into another heart the longing for that which only Christ can supply. Prayer for the sick in the presence of the giver, with thanks to God for the gift, will open the way for Christ's bidding, "Follow Me."

"Who gives himself with his alms feeds three, Himself, his hungering neighbor, and Me."

An invitation may now be given to attend the next sermon at the tent or tabernacle, and a Christian physician or the minister himself may speak of Christ's ministry of healing to both body and soul. What heart can resist this revealed love of God to sick and suffering men and women, and to those Who are tired of the world's empty and unsatisfying round of amusements and follies?

This may seem to some a one-sided ministry; but Christ Himself minis­tered to the sin sick, the soul sick, and the 'body sick. When criticized for the direction of His efforts, He replied, "They that be whole need not a physi­cian, but they that are sick," and, "I am not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance." It is those who are needy, and conscious of their need, that can be reached. And not only are those blessed who receive this minis­try, but those who engage in it are spiritually revived.

"Combine the medical missionary work with the proclamation of the third angel's message. Make regular, organized effort to lift the churches out of the dead level into which they have fallen, and have remained for years. Send into the churches workers who will set the principles of health reform in their connection with the third an­gel's message, before every family and individual. Encourage all to take a part in work for their fellow men, and see if the breath of life will not quickly return to these churches."—"Testimo­nies to Ministers," p. 416.

How many hundreds and thousands of dissatisfied men and women have sought the hidden manna ("I have meat to eat that ye know not of") in empty ceremonialism, fruitless fasts, painful penances, and long, wearying pilgrimages, only to return empty, dis­appointed, and discouraged. How many such, in both labors and objects of labor, might find in medical mission­ary work "the breath of life."